green. “I want you to have this as a gift from me.”
I took it without looking at it and slipped it into the front pocket of my skirt.
“Thanks,” I said, looking at the wall behind Gary W. Jensen’s head as he turned to go. His boots squealed over the linoleum and, before he stepped out of the office into the damp curtain of dusk, he turned at the door to its K-Mart Christmas jingling: “Bye.”
I tried to smile.
I didn’t know why.
The clock said twenty-five past eight, and the river sounded sloppy and fast outside, like someone running away with a bucket of cold black water.
M Y UNCLE ANDY tugs my mother’s arm, pulls her up from the couch, gentle but quick, and before he presses her to him she twirls, graceful, and laughs. He scoops one hand up under her breast, arm behind her, takes her hand in his other, and she scratches the back of his neck lightly with her fingernails as they dance barefoot in the living room to no music at all. Her nails are long and frosted, mother-of-pearl, and they make a dry sound as they move lightly across his flesh—a pencil scribbling numbers fast on a page.
She is in a red dress and black stockings, a string of fake pearls like small sea-teeth around her neck. My uncle Andy’s nice shirt is starched stiff and unbuttoned to the middle of his chest. He’s handsome, and young. He always has new clothes—pressed, pleated pants, skinny belts and ties. Tall and thin, but solid. His dark hair is combed off his forehead but falling, still, into his eyes, over and over. He pushes it back with a fast hand.
In the corner of the living room, the Christmas tree blinks like some stalled car’s hazard lights while, outside, the snow gets deeper, deeper, and more deaf. My father is out there somewhere on a two-lane road, trying to get home from another state, some place he’s gone to sell something to someone who wants it right away, who doesn’t care that it’s Christmas Eve. He calls every few hours to say he’s almost home, though still on the way, and it will take a long time in so much weather. I try to look out the window but all I see is their reflection in it:
My mother catches my uncle’s earlobe between her teeth. He opens his mouth, and only air comes out—pulling her closer, moving his hand down her spine to pull her hips to his. I press my face up against the black glass, and my breath leaves the shadow of ghost lips on the window, then disappears.
Out there, milk-blue hills of snow have rolled and drifted into smooth slopes, as if they’ve been butter-knifed across the front lawns along our narrow street, across the driveways, concealing sidewalks, front steps, all the frozen gardens and iced-over birdbaths on our block. All the plain houses, stuck like plastic cake decorations into a deep blizzard of cake, are identical to ours:
Two bedrooms. No dining room. A place in the kitchen to sit and eat dinner or to pay your bills. This rectangle of living room.
Here and there, a garage has been built. Instead of white, someone has painted the shutters red. But other than that, they’re exact. Each one with a dry green Christmas tree lit up, making the house a festive firetrap in December. A slow dance behind dark curtains. I hear them breathe behind me, and it’s a kind of music—all rhythm, just a drummer’s brush.
The lace around the wrists of my pajamas prickles. Pretty trim. Bric-a-brac with little, itchy teeth, nibbling.
I’m too young to be awake so late, even on the eve of Christmas.
When I got home that night, Rick was in blue boxer shorts and a plain T-shirt watching television in our living room. A handsome blond cop dropped to the concrete. Bullets whizzed above him. A mailman put his hand over the mouth of a screaming housewife, hysterical because someone’s blood had splattered her yellow dress. But on our television, the blood looked pink as the vacancy sign outside the Swan Motel—neon, phony, cheerful.
Rick turned the TV
I took it without looking at it and slipped it into the front pocket of my skirt.
“Thanks,” I said, looking at the wall behind Gary W. Jensen’s head as he turned to go. His boots squealed over the linoleum and, before he stepped out of the office into the damp curtain of dusk, he turned at the door to its K-Mart Christmas jingling: “Bye.”
I tried to smile.
I didn’t know why.
The clock said twenty-five past eight, and the river sounded sloppy and fast outside, like someone running away with a bucket of cold black water.
M Y UNCLE ANDY tugs my mother’s arm, pulls her up from the couch, gentle but quick, and before he presses her to him she twirls, graceful, and laughs. He scoops one hand up under her breast, arm behind her, takes her hand in his other, and she scratches the back of his neck lightly with her fingernails as they dance barefoot in the living room to no music at all. Her nails are long and frosted, mother-of-pearl, and they make a dry sound as they move lightly across his flesh—a pencil scribbling numbers fast on a page.
She is in a red dress and black stockings, a string of fake pearls like small sea-teeth around her neck. My uncle Andy’s nice shirt is starched stiff and unbuttoned to the middle of his chest. He’s handsome, and young. He always has new clothes—pressed, pleated pants, skinny belts and ties. Tall and thin, but solid. His dark hair is combed off his forehead but falling, still, into his eyes, over and over. He pushes it back with a fast hand.
In the corner of the living room, the Christmas tree blinks like some stalled car’s hazard lights while, outside, the snow gets deeper, deeper, and more deaf. My father is out there somewhere on a two-lane road, trying to get home from another state, some place he’s gone to sell something to someone who wants it right away, who doesn’t care that it’s Christmas Eve. He calls every few hours to say he’s almost home, though still on the way, and it will take a long time in so much weather. I try to look out the window but all I see is their reflection in it:
My mother catches my uncle’s earlobe between her teeth. He opens his mouth, and only air comes out—pulling her closer, moving his hand down her spine to pull her hips to his. I press my face up against the black glass, and my breath leaves the shadow of ghost lips on the window, then disappears.
Out there, milk-blue hills of snow have rolled and drifted into smooth slopes, as if they’ve been butter-knifed across the front lawns along our narrow street, across the driveways, concealing sidewalks, front steps, all the frozen gardens and iced-over birdbaths on our block. All the plain houses, stuck like plastic cake decorations into a deep blizzard of cake, are identical to ours:
Two bedrooms. No dining room. A place in the kitchen to sit and eat dinner or to pay your bills. This rectangle of living room.
Here and there, a garage has been built. Instead of white, someone has painted the shutters red. But other than that, they’re exact. Each one with a dry green Christmas tree lit up, making the house a festive firetrap in December. A slow dance behind dark curtains. I hear them breathe behind me, and it’s a kind of music—all rhythm, just a drummer’s brush.
The lace around the wrists of my pajamas prickles. Pretty trim. Bric-a-brac with little, itchy teeth, nibbling.
I’m too young to be awake so late, even on the eve of Christmas.
When I got home that night, Rick was in blue boxer shorts and a plain T-shirt watching television in our living room. A handsome blond cop dropped to the concrete. Bullets whizzed above him. A mailman put his hand over the mouth of a screaming housewife, hysterical because someone’s blood had splattered her yellow dress. But on our television, the blood looked pink as the vacancy sign outside the Swan Motel—neon, phony, cheerful.
Rick turned the TV
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